Evidence of Sin
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Catherine George
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16.2K
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11
CHAPTER ONE
SOMEWHERE between the third and fourth toast Chloe suddenly reached the end of her tether. Under cover of cheers and applause for the two happy couples she slipped from the crowded room, managed to reach the hall unnoticed and fled along the passage to the large, warm kitchen. Snatching a coat from the hooks in the back porch, she let herself out of the house and ran through the frosty, starlit garden, careering wildly down the slope of the lawn in her satin shoes. Gasping in the bitterly cold air, she made for the laurel hedge near the stream which divided the Parsonage from the house next door and slid through a gap to collapse on the decrepit bench she always made for in times of stress. Breath tearing painfully through her lungs, she sat slumped, staring into the water splashing its way with such callous cheerfulness over the stones along its bed.
So this was it: end of the line, time to face facts. The man she’d loved for so long was now not only officially engaged to someone else but, as anyone with half an eye could see, was so pleased with the arrangement that he couldn’t wait to rush his betrothed to the altar.
Chloe hugged her arms across her chest, reacting to the thought with almost physical pain. No tears, she told herself fiercely. She’d shed far too many on this subject already. She sniffed loudly, swallowing hard on the lump in her throat. It wouldn’t be the first time the laurels had hidden her misery from the world. But even as she promised herself it would be the last a violent sob was torn from her, and she was defeated by her own grief. She fought hard for control, but it was some time before a last shuddering sigh signalled the end of the storm.
“Forgive me, but is there some way I could help?” enquired a disembodied male voice.
Chloe froze.
“Don’t worry, I can’t see you through the leaves,” assured the voice. “I’m late, so I took the liberty of a shortcut by way of the gate at the bottom of the garden.”
“If you just carry on along the gravel walk you’ll arrive at the front door,” croaked Chloe in a hoarse whisper.
“By which I take it you’d like me to get the hell out of here and leave you alone.”
Who on earth was this? thought Chloe wildly.
“I think you should tell me what’s wrong,” went on the relentless voice. “You’ll feel better if you get it off your chest. It’s a proven fact that it’s easier to confide in strangers.”
“Not for me,” hissed Chloe, careless of her manners by this time. “Go away—I mean, go on in. Please.”
“That’s better.” Satisfaction coloured the voice.
“Better?”
“You’re annoyed now, instead of—desolate.”
His choice of adjective almost started Chloe off again. She clenched her fists, breathing deeply as she fought the tears back.
“Tell me,” commanded the voice. “Why are you alone and weeping, Niobe, when joy seems unconfined in the house? I can hear the music from here.”
Chloe ground her teeth in angry silence.
“If you won’t tell me, perhaps I could make a deduction or two.”
Reminding herself forcibly that the man, whoever he might be, was also a guest, Chloe quelled an urge to tell her unwanted companion exactly what to do with his deductions.
“Let me see... My invitation here tonight was to a party to celebrate a double engagement,” mused the voice. “The son and daughter of the house and their respective partners, I believe. You could be said daughter, already regretting the arrangement, or just a friend of the family, secretly rent by passion for one of the gentlemen involved.”
This time shock held Chloe speechless. The stranger’s shot had found target with uncanny accuracy.
“Ah, well,” drawled her unseen companion, “I see you’re not of a mind to confide. Nevertheless I think your tears have dried, mystery lady. In which case I’ll take myself off to make apologies to my hostess. Farewell, Niobe. Your secret’s safe with me. My lips are sealed. No one, I swear, shall ever know I heard a tearful maiden languishing behind the laurels.”
Burning with a variety of emotions, Chloe listened, tense, as his footsteps retreated along the gravel walk. She gave herself five minutes longer to pull herself together, then emerged furtively from her hiding place. She looked up at the house, outlined in all its Gothic Victorian eccentricity against the night sky. Lights blazed and music thumped like a giant heartbeat from the open windows on the ground floor. She sighed raggedly, hating the thought of going in. But more time spent outside would probably bring someone in search of her. Which would be a disaster with her face in its present sodden state. She hurried silently up the slope of the lawn to the back of the house, returned her ancient sheepskin to its peg, and flew on tiptoe up the back stairs to her room.
Ten minutes later Chloe strolled down the front staircase, flags flying and retouched eyes bright, every glossy red hair in place, her smile brilliant as she descended towards a group of her mother’s friends in the hall below.
“There you are, Chloe!” exclaimed her mother. “Why aren’t you dancing?”
“No one’s asked me yet,” returned Chloe gaily, then almost missed a step as her eyes met those of a tall man she’d never seen before. He was slim, with thick fair hair and a hawk-nosed, confident face. And without any effort he was very obviously the focal point of the group smiling up at her.
“Steady the buffs, darling. Come and meet our new neighbour,” said Mrs Lawrence, beaming with pleasure.
The newcomer inclined his head. “Piers Audley. How do you do?”
Chloe’s heart took a nosedive. The voice, which somehow managed to be crisp and drawling simultaneously, was unmistakable. “Chloe Lawrence,” she said woodenly. “How—how nice you could come. Welcome to Little Compton.”
Their eyes held for a moment, then Piers Audley smiled.
“I believe the music’s changed to something I can cope with. Since by some miracle you lack a partner at the moment, will you be mine?”
His choice of words won him a startled look from dark blue eyes, but his own, heavy-lidded and thick-lashed, were so blandly inscrutable that Chloe inclined her head in reluctant consent. Wishing passionately she’d stayed in her room and bolted the door, she walked ahead of Piers Audley to join the crowd in the shabby, high-ceilinged drawing-room.
The party was in full swing by this time, the speeches over and the furniture pushed back against the walls to make room for dancing. As Chloe and her companion joined the fray the lights were lowered, and guests who minutes before had been throwing themselves around came together in couples, moving slowly to music with a slow, sentimental beat. Over Piers Audley’s shoulder Chloe caught a glimpse of Marcus’s dark head bent close to the gleaming blonde curls of his Lisa, and in a far corner she could see her sister Jessica making very little pretence of movement at all in the arms of Dr David Warren, her handsome husband elect.
“Are you recovered, Niobe?” murmured Piers Audley, and Chloe sighed, resigned.
“So you knew it was me.”
“It wasn’t difficult to work out. Once I discovered there was another daughter of the house, temporarily missing, it seemed odds on she must be the grieving nymph among the laurels.”
Chloe shot a hostile look at the aquiline, clever face. “Mr Audley—”
“Not so formal, please.”
“Piers, then. Could you please forget you heard me making such a fool of myself tonight?”
“If you mean will I never mention it to anyone, that goes without saying. But your woe was heart-rending. I confess to enormous curiosity as to the cause.”
“Remember the cat,” advised Chloe tartly.
“I’m unlikely to die of curiosity.” His eyes held hers. “Mainly, I warn you, because I intend to have it satisfied. Some time.”
Chloe was saved from out-and-out rudeness by a welcome pause in the music. Lights flicked on, and with relief she introduced her partner to Marcus and Jess and several neighbours eager to meet the new owner of Clieve House. When supper was announced a moment later Piers Audley seemed fully absorbed into a crowd of her mother’s contemporaries, Chloe noted with relief, and for the rest of the evening, she promised herself, she’d give the disquieting stranger a wide berth.
“All right, little one?” asked Marcus, as they went into supper, and Chloe laughed, shutting all thought of Piers Audley and tears out of her mind.
“You’re the only man in the world who could ever call me ‘little one’!”
Lisa sighed enviously. “I just wish I were your height, Chloe. You seem to eat anything you like and still stay slim as a reed. I only look at a bar of chocolate and I gain inches everywhere.”
“Never mind, darling,” said Marcus, dropping a kiss on the gleaming blonde curls. “Men prefer their women round and cuddly.”
Chloe gave him a wry look. “Gee, thanks.”
Marcus grinned, unrepentant. “Come off it, Chlo. You know damn well they fancy tall, lanky redheads too—don’t I know it! When your face was plastered over every news-stand in the old days I couldn’t move for blokes pestering me for your telephone number.”
“And you had a famous photographer for a boyfriend. I don’t see how you could bear to give all that up, Chloe,” said Lisa, shaking her head in wonder.
“I’m sure you don’t,” said Jess drily, and thrust a plate into Chloe’s hand. “Eat. Gwen’s orders.”
“I’ll fill it for you,” offered David, his bright blue eyes teasing as he pushed Chloe towards the laden table. “Come on—you don’t have to count calories any more, cover girl.”
“If I’d had to count calories I wouldn’t have been one,” retorted Chloe. “Willpower was never my strong point.”
“So I’ve heard,” commented Lisa, smiling sweetly. “Marcus says you had so many men after you at one time it’s a wonder his hair isn’t grey.”
Marcus gave his betrothed a frown which brought colour to her cheeks. “Darling, I didn’t put it quite like that.”
Jessica put a selection of delicacies on to Chloe’s plate. “Go on, eat. And while you’re at it, tell all about the charismatic Mr Audley. Our legal eagle celeb. is younger than I expected—seriously yummy, in fact!” She looked across the room at the elegant man cornered by a brace of local matrons.
“You know as much as me.” Chloe speared a prawn without enthusiasm. “I’ve never met him before.”
“You were dancing with him,” said David, mouth full. “He must have said something.”
“He was—charming,” said Chloe, and smiled up at him. “Polite enough to dance with me when he found I was a wallflower.”
“Wallflower!” The others hooted in unison, David giving her an affectionate squeeze which attracted a keen look from Piers Audley across the supper table. He smiled very deliberately at Chloe, who, much to the interest of her companions, blushed to the roots of her hair.
“Well, well!” Marcus raised an eyebrow. “Something tells me our VIP fancies little Chloe. Let’s rescue the poor guy. Mrs Dawson is either asking him for a donation to the church restoration fund or bullying him into a talk for the WI.” And, laying his plate on a windowledge, Marcus strolled away, head and shoulders above everyone in the room.
“Isn’t he thoughtful?” sighed Lisa. “You two are so lucky to have a brother like Marcus.”
Jess exchanged a grin with Chloe. “We offer up prayers of gratitude for it daily, don’t we? But he’s no saint, Lisa. He’s only human.” She smiled at her fiancé. “You’re human too, darling, aren’t you?”
“You can say that again!” David leered suggestively at Chloe. “I only wish my religion allowed polygamy. Then I could marry both of you.”
Lisa, who had a tendency to take things literally, looked scandalised.
“Stop it!” said Chloe, grinning, then stiffened as she saw Marcus bringing Piers Audley across the room to join them. But as several other guests gravitated towards them at the same time she seized the chance to slip away to join her mother to help serve the puddings.
“Darling, there’s no need,” said Gwen Lawrence in an undertone as she ladled syllabub into glass bowls. “Louise Dawson would give a hand in a minute. You should be with the others.”
“My place is here with you,” said Chloe firmly, and smiled radiantly into the dazzled eyes of two of Marcus’s colleagues, both men plainly more interested in Chloe than the array of delicacies she offered.
But however much she busied herself with other guests, to her annoyance she found herself constantly aware of Piers Audley, who, it seemed, had no taste for sweet things. From the corner of her eye she saw David helping him from a vast platter of cheese on the sideboard across the room, and relaxed enough to indulge in a little badinage with some of the medical fraternity invited by Marcus and Jessica to the double celebration.
But once everyone was served Chloe found her way from the dining room barred by the tall elegant person of Piers Audley, coffee-cup in either hand.
He smiled at her, in a way which told her he knew his was the last company she wanted. “Your brother suggested I take you into the hall and make you sit down and drink this. I have it on the best authority that you like it sugarless with a dash of cream. May I have the pleasure of your company for a while?”
Knowing she’d risk maternal wrath if she offended the star guest, Chloe gave in gracefully.
“Of course. Thank you.” She led the way from the room into the draughty, stone-flagged hall to an oak settle half hidden from view under the arch of the back stairs. “Let’s sit here, then. Uncomfortable, but a little quieter than anywhere else at the moment.”
“You’ve been avoiding me,” he drawled, amused. “It isn’t the least necessary, you know. I gave you my word.”
Taken aback at such a frontal attack, Chloe bit her lip, then shrugged, returning his candour. “Even so, I’m sure you can appreciate my embarrassment. I didn’t anticipate an eavesdropper to my—my lapse out there.”
“I swear your secret’s safe with me.” A pair of hooded amber eyes held hers. “And as far as I can see, no one else seems to have the remotest idea that you languish after your sister’s fiancé.”
Chloe’s heart gave a great thump. “Why—why should you imagine my tears were for David? I could have been crying about any man here, or even some man who isn’t here at all.”
He shook his head. “I was watching that lively little family tableau from across the room. Your body language told me a great deal. And I’d hazard a guess that Dr Warren is no more immune to you than you to him, despite his alliance with your attractive sister.”
Chloe set her cup down with exquisite care. “One would think your field was psychiatry rather than law, Mr Audley.”
“I wouldn’t be good at my job if I didn’t make a study of human nature, Chloe Lawrence.” He smiled down into her eyes.
Her answering smile was brilliant as she saw her chance to change the subject. “And you’re very good, by all accounts. Even here in Little Compton your success rate is well known. Is it true that you get your clients off nine times out of ten?”
He shrugged non-committally. “If you can believe the popular Press. May I fetch you more coffee, or would you like a drink?”
“What I would really like,” said Chloe, with sudden, quiet vehemence, “is to go to bed, but as the music’s starting again I suppose I’ll just have to do my bit to entertain the troops.”
“You could always stay here and entertain me instead.”
Chloe sat very still. “It wouldn’t do for me to monopolise our guest of honour, Mr Audley.”
“Even if there’s nothing I’d like better?” he queried, the hint of amusement very much in evidence in his drawling, assured voice.
“Why?” she demanded, looking him in the eye. “Not that I need to ask!”
“I’m sure you don’t,” he returned, a smile twitching his lips. “It’s perfectly obvious. You’re the most decorative woman present. Besides, you rouse my curiosity—”
“That’s not what I meant—all you really want is to know why I was crying.”
“That too,” he agreed, his eyes holding hers, “but if you imagine that’s all I want you must have far less experience of men than I’d have expected.”
“Expected?” Chloe bristled. “What do you mean by that?”
“Only that a face and body like yours must be a magnet to my sex.”
She got to her feet abruptly. “There’s more to me than the way I look, Mr Audley.”
He nodded as he stood up. “You don’t have to tell me that, Chloe Lawrence. That’s why you interest me. I find your hint of mystery totally irresistible.”
Chloe’s mouth tightened. “Are you always so direct with women on such short acquaintance?”
“Only with those I meet in such fascinating circumstances,” he assured her suavely.
The approach of one of David’s friends saved Chloe the necessity of a withering response. “Thank you for bringing me coffee, Mr Audley,” she said with a saccharine smile. “Time to return to duties, I think. Will you excuse me?”
“Only with greatest reluctance,” he assured her, an appreciative gleam in his eye as Chloe smiled with radiance at the dazzled man who’d come in search of her.
As she joined the dancing it suddenly occurred to her that her sparring with Piers Audley had been useful in one way, at least. For several minutes at a time she’d actually given no thought to the grief which had sent her running to her hiding place for sanctuary earlier on.
For the rest of the evening Chloe put on a bright, skilled act which made her the central pivot of the party as far as the majority of male guests were concerned. But Piers Audley made no attempt to dance with her again. To her secret chagrin he seemed content with the company of the older Little Compton residents, all of whom were eager to express a warm welcome to the newcomer in their midst. But every now and then Chloe would catch him looking at her with an irritating hint of challenge which spurred her on to play out her role of quintessential party girl to the end. The most irritating—and surprising—thing of all, she discovered, was the fact that all the other men she danced with seemed utterly insipid after her exchange with Piers Audley. While the only man who could have stood comparison with the sophisticated barrister was much too engrossed in his fiancée to have any time for Chloe Lawrence.
As the hour struck midnight the usual pandemonium broke out, with kisses all round to mark the arrival of the New Year. Chloe was passed from hand to hand, the kisses she received varying in degree from brief and affectionate to the more intimate variety which she put an end to as swiftly as possible. When she came to Piers Audley she felt a sudden, unexpected prickle of anticipation, and braced herself in readiness, but he eyed her hectic flush with amusement, and contented himself with a mere shake of the hand.
“May the New Year be happier for you, Chloe Lawrence.”
“Thank you.” She smiled at him, furious with herself for feeling so disappointed. “Happy New Year to you, too.” Their eyes held for a moment, then with a polite little nod she excused herself to help Marcus and Jess hand out champagne.
Much to Chloe’s regret some guests were staying overnight. Not that there was any problem with space. The rambling old house had several attic bedrooms in addition to the others in more normal use, but tonight Chloe could have wished her home were small, without such scope for visitors. She would have given much to speed the last guest on the way, lock the door on the world and take to her bed for the foreseeable future. Unfortunately the party seemed all set to continue indefinitely, she noted glumly, an hour or so later. Then she noticed some of the older guests making a move, and, seeing her chance to escape, Chloe hurried to help see them off. Afterwards she drew her mother aside.
“Gwen, would it be terribly bad manners if I went off to bed now? I’ve done my duty where the dancing’s concerned—”
“My dear child, of course not,” said her mother firmly. “You look exhausted. You’ve been on the go since first thing this morning. I don’t know what I’d have done without you.” She gave Chloe a little push. “You insisted I have a rest this afternoon, remember. Leave everything to Jess and Lisa from now on. Off you go.”
Chloe gave her mother a hug, then stole up the back stairs to make use of a bathroom while there was still peace to do so. She slipped next door to her bedroom afterwards with a deep sigh of relief, weary as she hung up the expensive sliver of dark blue satin bought for the party. She removed all traces of the rather elaborate make-up she knew had been expected of her for the occasion, took down her heavy red hair and brushed it, then slid a warm, long-sleeved nightgown over her head, wrapped herself in an ancient grey wool dressing gown and tugged on thick red wool socks. She switched off the light, drew back the curtains and pulled down the window a crack, welcoming the frosty night air after the heat and cigarette smoke of the festivities below. She smiled wryly. Normally the atmosphere in the draughty old house was on the bracing side, but tonight her mother had agreed to keep the heating on later than usual for the benefit of guests used to city houses with modern central heating systems.
Curling up in her usual place on the wide window seat, Chloe gazed out at the stars, depressed to find that, bone-weary though she might be, sleep was a long way off. Her room was over the kitchen, looking out over the back lawn, where moving lights from cigarettes showed people strolling in the darkness, taking a breather from the music which still throbbed from the front of the house at volume since the only building within earshot of the Parsonage was the church.
Unexpectedly her thoughts turned not, as she’d expected, to the familiar pain of heartache, but to Piers Audley, successful barrister and cause of flutters in the Little Compton dovecote when he had inherited Clieve House from the elderly great-aunt who’d lived out the last years of her life in seclusion there. Chloe smiled wryly. How pleased her mother had been to have him turn up tonight—his first social appearance locally, and a definite feather in Gwen Lawrence’s cap, not least because her friend Louise Dawson had failed to lure the celebrity to her fork lunch on Boxing Day.
Piers Audley, a rising star in law circles, was also well known to the public because so many of his clients were celebrities in one field or another. Old Mrs Enderby, who kept cuttings of his successes, had taken satisfaction in telling Gwen Lawrence that her great-nephew’s remarkable skill with both witnesses and juries alike had earned him comparison with the great Marshall Hall of the previous century. And it had to be a man like that, of all people, Chloe thought bitterly, who’d been the one to eavesdrop on her stupid, melodramatic tears behind the laurels. And to crown it all he wasn’t at all what she’d expected. In any way. Piers Audley was one of the most attractive men she’d ever met. In other circumstances she could well have been drawn to him. Always supposing, Chloe, she told herself acidly, that a man like Piers Audley was likely to take any notice of a nobody from the Shires like you.
Chloe stayed where she was for a long time, watching the stars disappear and flakes of snow begin to feather past the window, until she heard people beginning to drift upstairs at last to bed. Deciding it was time to shut out the cold and get to bed herself, she reached to push up the window then stiffened, her own name jumping out at her from a slurred, laughing male conversation as two men went past beneath her window. One of them paused to strike a match, and Chloe leaned closer to the open sash, ignoring the cold as she discovered that some drunken idiot was actually taking a bet from his chum on the chances of getting into Chloe Lawrence’s bed to round off the evening.
“She’s a cracking-looking girl—used to be a model, and a right little raver, I’ve heard. Used to shack up with some photographer—” There was muffled, licentious laughter which made the furious eavesdropper long to hurl something down on their unsuspecting heads.
The amorous suitor, she realised, outraged, was Tim Armstrong, the trainee doctor at the practice where Marcus was a junior partner. He’d been charm personified earlier on, apart from a tendency to crush the life out of her during one of the slower numbers. Now, it seemed, he’d found out where she slept, and planned to pretend he’d mistaken her door for the bathroom if he was seen. Once he was in her room, he assured his friend, chortling, he was home and dry. Chloe ground her teeth in rage. The possibility of her refusal obviously never entered her drunken swain’s conceited head.
Chloe closed the window very quietly, thought for a moment, then stuffed pillows down the centre of her double bed, tucked in her beloved old teddy bear towards the top, pulled the covers round him and slid silently from the dark bedroom to race along the dimly lit upper hall to Jessica’s.
“Can I bunk in with you?” she whispered as she closed the door behind her, then stood transfixed with horror as a light went on beside the bed to reveal a very different face from Jessica’s.
